As Bates senior diver Kelsey Lamdin was warming up last Friday for the final competition of her collegiate career, her goal was to win an eighth All-America award and become the most decorated diver in Bates history.

But she would soon unintentionally prove herself as one of the toughest athletes ever to put on a Bobcat uniform.

The Portland Press Herald chronicled the high drama surrounding senior diver Kelsey Lamdin’s final performance at the NCAA Division III Swimming and Diving Championships, held at the University of Minnesota in March. During a warmup dive, she struck the board. Head and hands bleeding, she departed for a hospital, where she got stitched up (without anesthesia) and returned to compete. She finished 10th, securing All-America honors. “”I couldn’t imagine a more amazing sequence of events,” said Bates head coach Peter Casares. “It was a phenomenal display of courage.” [Original story]

Entering last weekend’s NESCAC Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships, Bates senior Kelsey Lamdin (Brunswick, Maine) already had six All-America honors, five All-NESCAC awards and three Bates diving records to her credit. What she didn’t have yet was a conference title, and she rectified that in a big way.

Competing in her hometown at Bowdoin’s Greason Pool, she started out by setting a pool record in the 1-meter competition on Friday with with a score of 466.90, meanwhile placing first, establishing a new Bates record and qualifying automatically for the NCAA Championships.

Not content with one NESCAC title, Lamdin grabbed another on Sunday in the 3-meter, scoring 452.55 points, well ahead of the competition and adding .30 points to her own previous Bates record in the event, set at NCAAs last year. By sweeping the diving competition, she was an easy choice as Diver of the Meet.

Lamdin will make her fourth trip to the NCAA Championships in as many years March 18-21 at the University of Minnesota.